Innocence Lost
by my99by
Summary: Seventeen-year-old Kenneth just wants to go back home, but the dead rising to feast on the living has to be the biggest obstacle. To worsen matters, the living cannot be trusted, forcing Kenneth to make decisions that he never thought he'd have to make. Dealing with themes of humanity, insanity, loss, and betrayal, Kenneth must do whatever it takes to make sure his family is safe.
1. Chapter 1

7

Prologue

It was a cold splash of water onto his face that caused Kenneth to wake with a start. He sat bolt upright and immediately swung his fist out in front of him, hitting nothing but air. While he couldn't see where he was due to the blindfold wrapped tightly around his eyes, it was at that moment that a fist caught him square in the jaw, knocking him back to the cold dirt floor with a thud. Kenneth could only lay there and groan as a series of kicks slammed into his chest and abdomen. 

" _I've had about a fucking 'nough of you you little shit!"_

A series of punches befell Kenneth, and he couldn't do anything to defend himself. He was tired, hungry, thirsty, and just didn't have the energy to stop what was happening. Then again, did it really matter anymore? Kenneth had lost everything in his life that had mattered to him.

There was nothing left for him.

Another pair of footsteps came into the dark area, and Kenneth felt his attacker stop beating him.

"What the hell is wrong with you? I thought you were just checking on him?" 

"He's a smart little asshole. Got outta his bond and took a swing at me. I'm telling you man, we shouldn't have—"

"What? I was supposed to leave him out there for the walkers? Is that what we do now? What the hell happened to your humanity?"

"We can't just help every struggling person out there! You know damn well that Hershel didn't want us here in the first place! You know that it was a miracle that he let us live here!"

Kenneth lay on the ground, feeling, tasting, the coppery blood oozing from his busted lip. His chest and stomach felt like there were a hundred needles lodged in them, and he just ached all over. While he didn't know where he was, he could smell the faint scent of manure, and the ground beneath him was covered primarily by what he assumed was straw. Maybe hay. Who gives a shit? They're the same color anyway. Anyhow, it seemed like he was in a barn.

The footsteps came closer to him, and Kenneth flinched when he felt fingers grasping the blindfold he wore. The blindfold was carefully removed, and while it was still pretty dark, he could now see at least some light. Mainly he could see the silver barrel of a colt python aimed directly at the spot between his eyes, the user glaring at him with his icy blue eyes. The owner of the magnum revolver had greyish brown stubble at a scowl, his face a look of utmost seriousness. Behind him stood a bald man in jeans and a brown muscle shirt that clearly showed how well built he was. In a holster on his belt was a Glock 17.

"Now, I need you to listen to me. You're going to tell me everything about where you're from, and who you were with before you got here. If you try anything to hurt any of the people here, _anything, I will kill you. Do you understand?"_

He never wavered. His finger was directly on the trigger, ready to blow off his head within seconds.

Kenneth's voice was dry, raspy, but nevertheless he spoke.

"When it all started, I was down in Florida. . . working as a mechanic with my Uncle. It was while I was there that the shit hit the fan, and I realized what I had to do. My family was in Pennsylvania, and I had to make the trip all the way back to just make sure that they were all right. But as I tried to make my way back—I had to walk through hell just to get there. . ."

Kenneth looked into his captor's eyes as his grip on the python eased.

Kenneth didn't express any emotion as he told his tale.

 _Thunk._

Cold steel sunk several inches deep into bone and managed to slice cleanly into the scalp and through the skull, cleaving into the sponge like brain tissue within. Just as quick as it happened, it's over in seconds, a hand grabbing the cadaver by the collar of its tattered shirt and giving it a forceful push resulting a wet squelching sound as the hatchet blade was yanked out of the skull.

Kenneth Duncan stood five feet away from the bedroom doorway, waiting in anticipation for the familiar sounds of uneven footsteps to come his way. All the lights in the house were off, casting malevolent shadows along the walls of the suburban home. But it wasn't the shadows that bothered him, no, not at all. The real monsters were the ones prowling around in a state worse than death.

Hell, who was he kidding. They _were_ death.

Kenneth waited for ten minutes, and he couldn't hear a thing. He glances down at the four other corpses at his feet, each one with a gaping wound in their skull that leaked blood and other brain fluids onto the once clean hardwood floor. Kenneth went about doing a routine search of the entire house from top to bottom, finding no other reanimated beings in the home. That was relief, as Kenneth had suffered enough already.

Cleanup had taken him over an hour, but it paid off at the end of the day. He dragged the corpses down a flight of stairs and out the house's back door to a relatively empty dumpster on the side of the home. He didn't bother wrapping the bodies in anything, as he didn't see the point. He wore yellow gloves to protect him from the bacteria and even wore a purple bandanna around his mouth and nose to prevent anything from reaching there. Once the cadavers were disposed of he made sure that every door and window was shut and locked properly. After cleaning up the pools of blood upstairs with some bleach and hot sudsy water, he went about searching the home from top to bottom. The loot he found was pretty good. There was food in the kitchen and even some in a mini fridge in the basement. In a broom closet upstairs Kenneth found a Usp .45 and a box of .45 rounds. The bathroom medicine cabinet a fair amount of painkillers, bandages, and rubbing alcohol inside, as well as some other drugs that could be useful. With his search over, Kenneth plopped down on the living room sofa after fixing himself a ham and cheese sandwich. Not sure what to expect, he turned on the television and immediately switched to the local news station.

The emergency broadcast system was activated, giving advice that really didn't help Kenneth much. He fished around his pocket for his phone and pulled it out, checking all the social media accounts he was connected to.

Kenneth instantly regretted it.

YouTube was still up and running, but filled to the brim of shocking footage from the cities. Rioting, looters, the police using live ammunition on everything that moved. New York City was in possibly the worst condition. The police were shooting everyone on sight in an attempt to stop this sickness from spreading further. Many videos consisted of the dead feasting on the living, and people claiming that they were setting up a safe house in a certain location, and that anyone was welcome. Anyway, Kenneth had a mission, and he knew that he'd have no choice but to act on it on his own. He was going to travel from his current position of a small Florida suburb, to Philadelphia Pennsylvania. He was going to travel across several states in order to get home, and find out if his family was okay.

It wasn't going to be an easy journey, but it was a journey he had to make nevertheless.

As soon as the sun rose the next morning Kenneth left the house to do more scavenging. One thing he had going for him was that the neighborhood was completely silent. Eerily silent that is.

Cars were either abandoned in the street or were crashed into other homes. Some were still in their driveways or garages. Still, this neighborhood had definitely been hit by the plague. Some houses had corpses strewn across front yards, torn apart or with bullets in their heads. There were only a few of the dead wandering around, but Kenneth only killed the ones that got too close. He had set out with two duffels and a large backpack, prepared to carry as much as he could back to his temporary base. He went from house to hose, taking everything that was useful.

He had hit the jackpot with this neighborhood.

Kenneth had found a plethora of food, medicine, and even found some pretty sweet weaponry. One house he had found an entire arsenal. It was a large carrying case full of machetes and some pretty exotic blades that looked wickedly sharp. One house had a weapon locker in the basement with a Benelli M4 shotgun and several boxes full of ammunition. When he was done, he carried his heavy bags back to his base, and dropped them off there. He made a few more supply runs around the neighborhood and didn't stop until sundown. Once he checked and rechecked the house's doors and windows he went into the garage and looked at his ride. It was a black SUV in good condition. It was large, spacious, and was basically exactly what he needed to make this trek across the U.S.

He could hardly sleep that night; partly due to the fact that he was leaving first thing in the morning, partly because this was going to be a journey that would most likely change the course of his life forever. All Kenneth knew was that if he was going to survive this trip, he was going to have to stay on his toes.

He left at first light, his supplies already packed into the SUV. The 17 year old boy had prepared for the long haul, as he had not one, not two, but three jerry cans full of fuel in the trunk also. He was dressed in grey camo pants, black steel toed boots, a black leather jacket, and a pair of thick, fingerless leather gloves. Slung onto his back was his benelli M4. He'd found a belt belonging to a police officer who would no longer be needing it. He kept his pistol in his belt holster and even kept his machete in a sheath he'd attached to his belt.

To keep it short, he was armed to the teeth; but deep down Kenneth knew, weapons didn't matter if the user was dead.

With no further hesitation, Kenneth hopped into the front seat of the SUV, started the engine, and pulled out of the garage, carefully avoiding the other cars on the street and keeping his eyes peeled for any movement.

The road turned out to be a mixed bag; some areas were cluttered with vehicles, some were not. As Kenneth drove through the wide streets of towns and along highways, he couldn't tear his eyes away from the chaos that the plague had created. Many shops had all of their windows shattered, merchandise and carts littering the parking lots. Corpses lay in the streets; either full of bullet holes or torn apart beyond recognition. The worst sights to see were those where fierce battles took place.

While passing through one small town he had stopped to survey the area. Kenneth stood on top of the SUV's roof and looked around with a pair of binoculars, and was shocked at what he saw approximately four blocks away. An entire street was packed with the dead; they shambled around soaked in fresh blood, feeding on dripping appendages or crowded around fresh kill like a group of buzzards. The police station in the middle of the crowd was in flames; all the windows were smashed and spewed forth thick black smoke that carried on the wind. That town had been horrifying to be in, as it had truly fallen to the dead.

Upon leaving town he found himself back on the highway, where things were still shocking to see. At one point Kenneth even found an RV sitting in the middle of the highway, its door wide open. The door's interior was covered in blood, and there was a leech trail of the crimson fluid leading from the RV to the metal guard rail on the right side of the road. The trail led to somewhere off the road.

Kenneth stopped the SUV and got out, keeping the engine running just in case. Drawing his Benelli M4, he slowly approached the winnebago, and kicked the door. The area was so quiet that the sound actually made an echo. When he received no answer he entered the RV, and was met with a gruesome sight. A woman with her entire head missing, blood and brain matter splattered across the wall of the RV. A Remington 870 lay on the floor with a single spent shell casing. Kenneth took the gun and left, wanting nothing more than to erase that image from his mind.

It was after the sun had set down that kenneth had stopped to rest. Call it a bad habit, but Kenneth didn't believe in taking breaks in a time of crisis. Every day was spent on the road, scavenging for anything of use, and refueling the vehicle. It was only in the dark that he would stop and get some sleep.

However, sleep was a tough thing to get nowadays.

He slept with a hand on his pistol every night, afraid of one of those undead monsters to grab him while he slept. It was a thought that just kept him awake at night, that made him check the locks on the doors, and made him check to see if all of the windows were completely shut. Still, the paranoia was there, slowly eating away at his mind, filling his brain to the brim with scenarios that ended with him dying before he could finally get home. . .

Kenneth always would find a part of the road lacking a guard rail and park in the middle of a field somewhere, far enough from the road to avoid the roamers, and wide enough space to be able to see around him.

As Kenneth laid his head against the headrest, his thoughts drifted to home. His family was tightly knit, and chances are his father had the entire house boarded up, the pantry stocked with a few months supply of food, and the basement filled with enough canned goods to get through several more months. No doubt Kenneth's father would be on watch constantly, while his mother probably begs him to go to sleep and let her take watch.

Kenneth Chuckled. His dad was an army ranger, and had his training and combat experience burned into his mind. While he was an easy going guy, he could kick some serious ass and get shit done when the situation called for it. Kenneth could rest easy knowing his mother was in good hands.

He left at dawn, as soon as the slightest ray of sunlight manages to permeate that near black membrane that was the remnants of night. As he continued his journey, he had spotted something very peculiar. It was a semi truck; a bright red one with a contained attached to the back. It wasn't normal, not at all following recent events. Kenneth hadn't actually seen a living breathing person for the past week.

His first mistake was stopping the car.

The second was lowering his window and waving.

The truck came to screeching stop several hundred feet away, and two men got out.

They were both dressed in bulletproof vests and had AR-15 rifles in their arms. Kenneth barely had time to think before he realized that they were aiming at him.

" _OH FUCK!"_

The incoming weapon fire shattered the windshield, sending shards of glass flying in every direction. Kenneth kicked open the door and scrambled out of the vehicle, his Benelli M4 in his hand. He ran to the rear of the SUV as sparks danced in the air as bullets made contact with the vehicle. Kenneth briefly popped out of his cover and squeezed off five shots in succession, catching one of the marauders in the shoulder.

" _You piece of shit!"_ His comrade shouted.

He continued to squeeze down on the trigger until the gun clicked empty. Kenneth sprinted from behind the SUV and fired 12 gauge buckshot directly into the marauder's skull. It's strange how the body acts after the main control center has been destroyed. The head explodes; the top half of the skull, including the nose, goes flying, while the remaining bottom half stays attached to the body, spewing forth blood and other arterial fluids into the air. The body goes limp, doing a dark and morbid dance as it falls to the ground awkwardly, still pumping blood onto the asphalt.

For a ten seconds Kenneth stands there frozen. The harsh reality of the fact that he just shot a man—the fact that he actually aimed at his head and pulled the trigger—slams into his chest like a stack of bricks. The shock of the would be robber's corpse, allows the shock to set in, and turns Kenneth's legs to jelly.

In Kenneth's shock he fails to notice that the second bandit had recovered, the shell striking a rather strong area of the vest. He tackles Kenneth, sending the shotgun spinning across the asphalt and out of reach.

"You dumb fuck! You killed him! _You fucking killed him you asshole! Now you're gonna pay!"_

He sent a fist sailing into Kenneth's jaw, sending needles of pain to spread across his face. Kenneth punches his assailant in return. Urgently reaching for the pistol on his belt. When he manages to yank the pistol from its holster, he placed the barrel against his assailant's abdomen and fired.

The bullet tears through his intestines and erupts out through his lower back.

He wails, Kenneth kicking the man off of him and scrambling to his feet. He fired a .45 caliber round into his skull without any hesitation, the head jerking violently as the bullet tears through the man's skull, ending his existence.

Kenneth fell to knees on the road, his head in his hands.

But it was at that moment he heard the clicking of a gun.

He raised his head to find the barrel of an M14 pointed at him.

" _Well, that was quite the show huh?"_


	2. Chapter 2

7

Prologue

It was a cold splash of water onto his face that caused Kenneth to wake with a start. He sat bolt upright and immediately swung his fist out in front of him, hitting nothing but air. While he couldn't see where he was due to the blindfold wrapped tightly around his eyes, it was at that moment that a fist caught him square in the jaw, knocking him back to the cold dirt floor with a thud. Kenneth could only lay there and groan as a series of kicks slammed into his chest and abdomen. 

" _I've had about a fucking 'nough of you you little shit!"_

A series of punches befell Kenneth, and he couldn't do anything to defend himself. He was tired, hungry, thirsty, and just didn't have the energy to stop what was happening. Then again, did it really matter anymore? Kenneth had lost everything in his life that had mattered to him.

There was nothing left for him.

Another pair of footsteps came into the dark area, and Kenneth felt his attacker stop beating him.

"What the hell is wrong with you? I thought you were just checking on him?" 

"He's a smart little asshole. Got outta his bond and took a swing at me. I'm telling you man, we shouldn't have—"

"What? I was supposed to leave him out there for the walkers? Is that what we do now? What the hell happened to your humanity?"

"We can't just help every struggling person out there! You know damn well that Hershel didn't want us here in the first place! You know that it was a miracle that he let us live here!"

Kenneth lay on the ground, feeling, tasting, the coppery blood oozing from his busted lip. His chest and stomach felt like there were a hundred needles lodged in them, and he just ached all over. While he didn't know where he was, he could smell the faint scent of manure, and the ground beneath him was covered primarily by what he assumed was straw. Maybe hay. Who gives a shit? They're the same color anyway. Anyhow, it seemed like he was in a barn.

The footsteps came closer to him, and Kenneth flinched when he felt fingers grasping the blindfold he wore. The blindfold was carefully removed, and while it was still pretty dark, he could now see at least some light. Mainly he could see the silver barrel of a colt python aimed directly at the spot between his eyes, the user glaring at him with his icy blue eyes. The owner of the magnum revolver had greyish brown stubble at a scowl, his face a look of utmost seriousness. Behind him stood a bald man in jeans and a brown muscle shirt that clearly showed how well built he was. In a holster on his belt was a Glock 17.

"Now, I need you to listen to me. You're going to tell me everything about where you're from, and who you were with before you got here. If you try anything to hurt any of the people here, _anything, I will kill you. Do you understand?"_

He never wavered. His finger was directly on the trigger, ready to blow off his head within seconds.

Kenneth's voice was dry, raspy, but nevertheless he spoke.

"When it all started, I was down in Florida. . . working as a mechanic with my Uncle. It was while I was there that the shit hit the fan, and I realized what I had to do. My family was in Pennsylvania, and I had to make the trip all the way back to just make sure that they were all right. But as I tried to make my way back—I had to walk through hell just to get there. . ."

Kenneth looked into his captor's eyes as his grip on the python eased.

Kenneth didn't express any emotion as he told his tale.

 _Thunk._

Cold steel sunk several inches deep into bone and managed to slice cleanly into the scalp and through the skull, cleaving into the sponge like brain tissue within. Just as quick as it happened, it's over in seconds, a hand grabbing the cadaver by the collar of its tattered shirt and giving it a forceful push resulting a wet squelching sound as the hatchet blade was yanked out of the skull.

Kenneth Duncan stood five feet away from the bedroom doorway, waiting in anticipation for the familiar sounds of uneven footsteps to come his way. All the lights in the house were off, casting malevolent shadows along the walls of the suburban home. But it wasn't the shadows that bothered him, no, not at all. The real monsters were the ones prowling around in a state worse than death.

Hell, who was he kidding. They _were_ death.

Kenneth waited for ten minutes, and he couldn't hear a thing. He glances down at the four other corpses at his feet, each one with a gaping wound in their skull that leaked blood and other brain fluids onto the once clean hardwood floor. Kenneth went about doing a routine search of the entire house from top to bottom, finding no other reanimated beings in the home. That was relief, as Kenneth had suffered enough already.

Cleanup had taken him over an hour, but it paid off at the end of the day. He dragged the corpses down a flight of stairs and out the house's back door to a relatively empty dumpster on the side of the home. He didn't bother wrapping the bodies in anything, as he didn't see the point. He wore yellow gloves to protect him from the bacteria and even wore a purple bandanna around his mouth and nose to prevent anything from reaching there. Once the cadavers were disposed of he made sure that every door and window was shut and locked properly. After cleaning up the pools of blood upstairs with some bleach and hot sudsy water, he went about searching the home from top to bottom. The loot he found was pretty good. There was food in the kitchen and even some in a mini fridge in the basement. In a broom closet upstairs Kenneth found a Usp .45 and a box of .45 rounds. The bathroom medicine cabinet a fair amount of painkillers, bandages, and rubbing alcohol inside, as well as some other drugs that could be useful. With his search over, Kenneth plopped down on the living room sofa after fixing himself a ham and cheese sandwich. Not sure what to expect, he turned on the television and immediately switched to the local news station.

The emergency broadcast system was activated, giving advice that really didn't help Kenneth much. He fished around his pocket for his phone and pulled it out, checking all the social media accounts he was connected to.

Kenneth instantly regretted it.

YouTube was still up and running, but filled to the brim of shocking footage from the cities. Rioting, looters, the police using live ammunition on everything that moved. New York City was in possibly the worst condition. The police were shooting everyone on sight in an attempt to stop this sickness from spreading further. Many videos consisted of the dead feasting on the living, and people claiming that they were setting up a safe house in a certain location, and that anyone was welcome. Anyway, Kenneth had a mission, and he knew that he'd have no choice but to act on it on his own. He was going to travel from his current position of a small Florida suburb, to Philadelphia Pennsylvania. He was going to travel across several states in order to get home, and find out if his family was okay.

It wasn't going to be an easy journey, but it was a journey he had to make nevertheless.

As soon as the sun rose the next morning Kenneth left the house to do more scavenging. One thing he had going for him was that the neighborhood was completely silent. Eerily silent that is.

Cars were either abandoned in the street or were crashed into other homes. Some were still in their driveways or garages. Still, this neighborhood had definitely been hit by the plague. Some houses had corpses strewn across front yards, torn apart or with bullets in their heads. There were only a few of the dead wandering around, but Kenneth only killed the ones that got too close. He had set out with two duffels and a large backpack, prepared to carry as much as he could back to his temporary base. He went from house to hose, taking everything that was useful.

He had hit the jackpot with this neighborhood.

Kenneth had found a plethora of food, medicine, and even found some pretty sweet weaponry. One house he had found an entire arsenal. It was a large carrying case full of machetes and some pretty exotic blades that looked wickedly sharp. One house had a weapon locker in the basement with a Benelli M4 shotgun and several boxes full of ammunition. When he was done, he carried his heavy bags back to his base, and dropped them off there. He made a few more supply runs around the neighborhood and didn't stop until sundown. Once he checked and rechecked the house's doors and windows he went into the garage and looked at his ride. It was a black SUV in good condition. It was large, spacious, and was basically exactly what he needed to make this trek across the U.S.

He could hardly sleep that night; partly due to the fact that he was leaving first thing in the morning, partly because this was going to be a journey that would most likely change the course of his life forever. All Kenneth knew was that if he was going to survive this trip, he was going to have to stay on his toes.

He left at first light, his supplies already packed into the SUV. The 17 year old boy had prepared for the long haul, as he had not one, not two, but three jerry cans full of fuel in the trunk also. He was dressed in grey camo pants, black steel toed boots, a black leather jacket, and a pair of thick, fingerless leather gloves. Slung onto his back was his benelli M4. He'd found a belt belonging to a police officer who would no longer be needing it. He kept his pistol in his belt holster and even kept his machete in a sheath he'd attached to his belt.

To keep it short, he was armed to the teeth; but deep down Kenneth knew, weapons didn't matter if the user was dead.

With no further hesitation, Kenneth hopped into the front seat of the SUV, started the engine, and pulled out of the garage, carefully avoiding the other cars on the street and keeping his eyes peeled for any movement.

The road turned out to be a mixed bag; some areas were cluttered with vehicles, some were not. As Kenneth drove through the wide streets of towns and along highways, he couldn't tear his eyes away from the chaos that the plague had created. Many shops had all of their windows shattered, merchandise and carts littering the parking lots. Corpses lay in the streets; either full of bullet holes or torn apart beyond recognition. The worst sights to see were those where fierce battles took place.

While passing through one small town he had stopped to survey the area. Kenneth stood on top of the SUV's roof and looked around with a pair of binoculars, and was shocked at what he saw approximately four blocks away. An entire street was packed with the dead; they shambled around soaked in fresh blood, feeding on dripping appendages or crowded around fresh kill like a group of buzzards. The police station in the middle of the crowd was in flames; all the windows were smashed and spewed forth thick black smoke that carried on the wind. That town had been horrifying to be in, as it had truly fallen to the dead.

Upon leaving town he found himself back on the highway, where things were still shocking to see. At one point Kenneth even found an RV sitting in the middle of the highway, its door wide open. The door's interior was covered in blood, and there was a leech trail of the crimson fluid leading from the RV to the metal guard rail on the right side of the road. The trail led to somewhere off the road.

Kenneth stopped the SUV and got out, keeping the engine running just in case. Drawing his Benelli M4, he slowly approached the winnebago, and kicked the door. The area was so quiet that the sound actually made an echo. When he received no answer he entered the RV, and was met with a gruesome sight. A woman with her entire head missing, blood and brain matter splattered across the wall of the RV. A Remington 870 lay on the floor with a single spent shell casing. Kenneth took the gun and left, wanting nothing more than to erase that image from his mind.

It was after the sun had set down that kenneth had stopped to rest. Call it a bad habit, but Kenneth didn't believe in taking breaks in a time of crisis. Every day was spent on the road, scavenging for anything of use, and refueling the vehicle. It was only in the dark that he would stop and get some sleep.

However, sleep was a tough thing to get nowadays.

He slept with a hand on his pistol every night, afraid of one of those undead monsters to grab him while he slept. It was a thought that just kept him awake at night, that made him check the locks on the doors, and made him check to see if all of the windows were completely shut. Still, the paranoia was there, slowly eating away at his mind, filling his brain to the brim with scenarios that ended with him dying before he could finally get home. . .

Kenneth always would find a part of the road lacking a guard rail and park in the middle of a field somewhere, far enough from the road to avoid the roamers, and wide enough space to be able to see around him.

As Kenneth laid his head against the headrest, his thoughts drifted to home. His family was tightly knit, and chances are his father had the entire house boarded up, the pantry stocked with a few months supply of food, and the basement filled with enough canned goods to get through several more months. No doubt Kenneth's father would be on watch constantly, while his mother probably begs him to go to sleep and let her take watch.

Kenneth Chuckled. His dad was an army ranger, and had his training and combat experience burned into his mind. While he was an easy going guy, he could kick some serious ass and get shit done when the situation called for it. Kenneth could rest easy knowing his mother was in good hands.

He left at dawn, as soon as the slightest ray of sunlight manages to permeate that near black membrane that was the remnants of night. As he continued his journey, he had spotted something very peculiar. It was a semi truck; a bright red one with a contained attached to the back. It wasn't normal, not at all following recent events. Kenneth hadn't actually seen a living breathing person for the past week.

His first mistake was stopping the car.

The second was lowering his window and waving.

The truck came to screeching stop several hundred feet away, and two men got out.

They were both dressed in bulletproof vests and had AR-15 rifles in their arms. Kenneth barely had time to think before he realized that they were aiming at him.

" _OH FUCK!"_

The incoming weapon fire shattered the windshield, sending shards of glass flying in every direction. Kenneth kicked open the door and scrambled out of the vehicle, his Benelli M4 in his hand. He ran to the rear of the SUV as sparks danced in the air as bullets made contact with the vehicle. Kenneth briefly popped out of his cover and squeezed off five shots in succession, catching one of the marauders in the shoulder.

" _You piece of shit!"_ His comrade shouted.

He continued to squeeze down on the trigger until the gun clicked empty. Kenneth sprinted from behind the SUV and fired 12 gauge buckshot directly into the marauder's skull. It's strange how the body acts after the main control center has been destroyed. The head explodes; the top half of the skull, including the nose, goes flying, while the remaining bottom half stays attached to the body, spewing forth blood and other arterial fluids into the air. The body goes limp, doing a dark and morbid dance as it falls to the ground awkwardly, still pumping blood onto the asphalt.

For a ten seconds Kenneth stands there frozen. The harsh reality of the fact that he just shot a man—the fact that he actually aimed at his head and pulled the trigger—slams into his chest like a stack of bricks. The shock of the would be robber's corpse, allows the shock to set in, and turns Kenneth's legs to jelly.

In Kenneth's shock he fails to notice that the second bandit had recovered, the shell striking a rather strong area of the vest. He tackles Kenneth, sending the shotgun spinning across the asphalt and out of reach.

"You dumb fuck! You killed him! _You fucking killed him you asshole! Now you're gonna pay!"_

He sent a fist sailing into Kenneth's jaw, sending needles of pain to spread across his face. Kenneth punches his assailant in return. Urgently reaching for the pistol on his belt. When he manages to yank the pistol from its holster, he placed the barrel against his assailant's abdomen and fired.

The bullet tears through his intestines and erupts out through his lower back.

He wails, Kenneth kicking the man off of him and scrambling to his feet. He fired a .45 caliber round into his skull without any hesitation, the head jerking violently as the bullet tears through the man's skull, ending his existence.

Kenneth fell to knees on the road, arms closed around his stomach as he heaved. Finally, his stomach gave way, mouth spewing the contents of his breakfast across the asphalt.

This was the first time he had ever killed a man, and he hoped to god that this would be the last time.


End file.
